Watch & Jewelley Factory Outlet co-owner Debby Wyatt says it’s a miracle that a three-foot angel statue was left unscathed after a car drove through the store’s front window in September.
Wyatt said the angel, which she has nicknamed “Mary” will have a more prominent place in the recently rebuilt store, which is set to reopen on Wednesday.
“We made a special spot for the angel and she’s got a special spot in our new store, so it’s right beside our counters and our tills and she’s right there, everybody will see her,” Wyatt told the Gazette on Monday.
It was coming up on 3 p.m. on Sept. 9 and, with no customers in the store, John Wyatt, Debby’s husband, had gone out to the back of the store for a cigarette.
Moments later an elderly woman drove her Ford Taurus through the front window. The impact completely destroyed two of the four front windows, as well as numerous display cases inside the store.
“What’s a miracle about this is that our store always has people inside, always,” Debby noted. “There is always somebody with a battery or a sale or something.”
The car eventually came to rest in the back room of the store, but not before dismantling a wall separating the sales area.
The collision even caused structural concerns for O’Mailles Irish Pub, located next door.
“When she flew in the store, it was a miracle because there wasn’t a soul in the store, which is unusual,” said Debby, adding that the goldsmith had also left the store briefly just before the accident occurred.
“I wasn’t in the store. I was just about to come and I had a phone call and I always sit at the back with John when I first come there and I just didn’t come because I had to be somewhere else, so that’s a miracle,” she said.
Debby said the woman, who was 85 at the time of the accident, was taken to hospital and released several hours later.
“She got confused, thought the gas was the brakes and the brakes was the gas. She flew over the curb, went through the window. She went from one end of the store right through to the back of the store so the whole store was destroyed,” said Debby.
Clean-up efforts after the accident yielded a surprising discovery, that the angel statue had been left perfectly intact.
“That’s why we wanted to put her back in the store, to make a special case for her. So she’s up in the wall, everyone can see her but that was the only thing that was left in our store,” said Debby.
“I think it’s a miracle that no one was hurt or killed and if someone was in the store, they definitely would have been killed, we think.”
